While many businesses in Aggieville close for the night, others, including the bars and some restaurants, stay open later. Students and locals can hang out in the bars until closing at 2 a.m. Some might stumble home and others might stick around for a little bit longer to grab a bite to eat.
“(People) are looking for somewhere to go, something to eat,” Ashley Strother, general manager at PepperJax Grill, said.
Strother said it is easy to tell when the bars start to close down because it gets very busy in PepperJax once they do.
PepperJax is not the only business that stays open late to serve the bar crowd. The Varsity Truck and Jimmy John’s also stay open late and experience the rowdier drunk crowd, according to Caleb Roth, Varsity Truck worker, and Sara Newell, assistant manager at Jimmy John’s.
“The night shift is the most fun,” Newell said. “You never know what you’re going to get.”
Newell said it can get pretty crazy in Jimmy John’s once the bars let out. She said one night, she and the other employees had to break up four fights.
Roth said the Varsity Truck also has fights break out between customers some nights, as people get rambunctious after a night of drinking.
Strother said although fights do happen at PepperJax every now and then, they do not happen as often as in some other businesses in Aggieville. She said there has been damage to the bathroom sinks and cabinets in the past, however.
“(PepperJax) is pretty lucky with customers not getting too bad,” Strother said.
Strother and Roth said Fake Patty’s Day is the busiest day not only for the bars, but for many restaurants as well.
“From the time we open to the time we close, (we have a line),” Strother said.
Roth said sometimes the line has been so packed that he and his co-workers have had a hard time getting inside to start their shifts. Once, a man even tried to start a fight as Roth and his co-workers tried to work their way inside.
Another night working at the Varsity Truck, Roth said two women tried to escape by crawling through people’s legs after not paying for their food.
Since the end of the night can get kind of crazy, Newell said she recommends customers arriving should know what they want to order before getting to the cash register.
